I come from a very large family – nine kids – and the mealtime rule in our house was you ate what was put before you. If you refused to eat it, well, you didn’t eat. If one of us asked for something else to eat, my mother’s stock answer was, “What do you think this is, kid, a restaurant?”
It’s been nothing short of an honor being a sportswriter for the Navarre Press and Press Gazette. But now I have bigger dreams to fulfill.
Last Tuesday morning, in my potential spam direct message folder on social media, I received an invitation to participate in the 2024 National Combine Series, opening the door for the possibility to play in the US Army Bowl at a later date.
Did Santa Rosa County compromise the integrity of its water protection zone by approving a variance to allow RaceTrac to install underground storage tanks at a station on State Road 87? We don’t think so, but the unpopular decision raises some questions about how the county manages its various overlay districts.
It is Wednesday evening and I realize that I have not written a column for the coming week. It seems I have a poor memory. Admittedly, I am getting older, and some forgetfulness is to be expected, but the forgetfulness that is troublesome to me has less to do with my age and more to do with my faith. I forget what God has done in the past, what he assures for the future, and his faithfulness in the present, and so I worry.
This just in. We are past the point of ‘that would never happen in sports.’ Way past it.
In fact, I can’t even tell you the date of when it officially happened. But we are there, and no way does it ever trend in the other direction again. It would take a miracle for it to happen.
“In Santa Rosa County, our sense of safety is a testament to the dedication and hard work of my men and women in uniform and the other First Responders, whose partnerships we greatly appreciate and depend on. Yet, this safety net faces a critical threat—one that originates from unsurmountable growth within our county.
“What you win them with,” a seasoned pastor once advised, “is what you win them to. If it is hotdogs, clowns and balloons, you will have to keep the grill going and the clowns on retainer, because the moment you stop, people will leave.” By God’s grace, the church I was serving at the time was growing rapidly, and we who were on the pastoral staff had a healthy sense of inadequacy, so we sought the counsel of pastors of larger churches. That seasoned pastor was not at all suggesting that we hire clowns and start grilling hotdogs, his was a word of caution. Years later, I learned that his advice was not original, but a piece of wisdom shared by discerning pastors.
Milton’s boys basketball team was up 10 points early in the second quarter of a regional basketball quarterfinal on the road, and you couldn’t help but start to believe that maybe the dream of an upset win over the No. 1 seed was going to come true.
I just finished reading in Genesis about Joseph and his grace toward his brothers, who had sold him into slavery. God sovereignly raised him from slave to second in authority in Egypt to ready it for a famine; Joseph invited his family to join him. His father, Jacob, near death, made him promise not to bury him in Egypt. He directed Joseph to do something strange: Joseph was to place his hand under Jacob’s thigh, then give his promise.
